I don't really buy that. There are a lot of situations (e.g. being directed to park in a space at a fairgrounds, ski area, or whatever) that you can't reasonably expect AFAIK to be programmed into a car's computer. Even if a car can legitimately handle roads under most circumstances, they're not going to be able to handle everything.
"Because the Origin does not have manual controls, the NHTSA must issue an exception to the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards to permit operation on public roads"
Too bad that project failed.
I think their point was "it's not ready yet."